Angela Couloumbis

Harrisburg Bureau

Angela Couloumbis covers state government in Harrisburg. She has been a reporter at the Inquirersince 1996, covering city government, courts and neighborhoods in Philadelphia and Camden, and the governors and governments of New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Gov. Corbett has some explaining to do, according to former Gov. Ed Rendell.

Speaking on a Philadelphia sports talk radio show Monday, the former district attorney-turned-politician questioned why investigators with the state Attorney General’s office, under Corbett’s direction, did not discover the apparently damning emails relating to the Sandusky scandal that were uncovered last week by former FBI director Louis Freeh. Freeh had been hired by Penn State to investigate the university’s handling of the child sexual abuse allegations against Sandusky.

“It’s certainly something the governor should answer,” Rendell said on the Mike Missanelli show on 97.5, The Fanatic.

In fact, Rendell maintained, Corbett should be answering a whole host of questions involving his office’s handling of the Sandusky case, including why the investigation took as long as it did, and why initially there were so little manpower assigned to the case.

“Those are legitimate questions,” said Rendell, adding that Corbett should not get indignant when questioned about the case because “when you run for public office, you have to understand that you are going to be questioned, no matter what you do.”

“It’s different from running your own business, it’s different from running your own law firm,” Rendell added. “When you run for public office, you have the duty to explain.”

For his part, Corbett has said he has answered such questions – over and over again. In fact, the Republican governor got hot piping mad when, in the wake of the Freeh report’s release last week, he was asked whether he believed he should have done anything differently when running the Sandusky investigation.

Corbett spokesman Kevin Harley earlier today chalked up Rendell’s musings to the former governor’s penchant for hearing the sound of his own voice.

“For somebody like Ed Rendell,” said Harley, “there is no topic outside his realm when he gets to hear the sound of his own voice.”

Harley said Corbett, while Attorney General, took on the Sandusky case when no one else would. And he helped build a case that resulted in Sandusky being found guilty on 45 of 48 counts against him.

Harley said Freeh’s investigation benefited from a spirit of cooperation of the new leadership at the helm of Penn State – former PSU president Graham Spanier resigned last fall in the wake of the scandal, and was prominently named in Freeh’s report as being one of four top university officials who allegedly participated in a cover-up of Sandusky’s crimes.

In its investigation, the Attorney General’s office asked for emails – but didn’t get them.

“If people want to play Monday morning prosecutor, that’s fine,” said Harley. “But you can’t argue with the results. The jury’s verdict is a complete vindication of the thoroughness of the investigation.”